Thenumber of speakers of English in Shakespeare′s time is estima

Thenumber of speakers of English in Shakespeare′s time is estimated to have beenabout five million.Today it is estimated that some 260 million people speak itas a(an)21?language,mainlyin the United States,Canada,Great Britain,Ireland,South Africa,Australiaand New Zealand.In addition to the standard varieties of English found inthese areas,22?are a greatmany regional and social varieties of the language as well as?23?levels of usage that are employedboth in its spoken and written forms. In fact,it is?24?to estimate the numberof people in the world who have acquired an adequate working knowledge ofEnglish in addition to their own languages.The?25?for English learningand the situations in which such learning takes place are so varied that itis 26 to explain and still moredifficult to judge?27?forms an adequateworking knowledge for each situation. The main reason forthe widespread?28?for English is its present dayimportance as a world language.Besides 29 the indefinite needs of its nativespeakers,English is a language in which some of important works inscience,technology,and other?30 are beingproduced,and not always by native speakers.It is widely used for 31 purposes as meteorological(气象的)and airport communications,international conferences,and the?32?of information over the radio andtelevision networks of many?33.It is a language of widercommunication for a number of developing countries,specially former Britishcolonies.Many of these countries have multilingual?34.and need a language for internalcommunication in such matters as government,commerce,industry,,law and 35 as well as for internationalcommunication and for entrance to the scientific and techno-logicaldevelopments in the West. 第23题答案是（ ）
A、various
B、similar
C、familiar
D、same
【正确答案】：A
【题目解析】：第23题考查的是形容词的选择，需要根据上下文语境来确定最合适的选项。 在原文中，“23?levels of usage that are employed both in its spoken and written forms”意味着需要选择一个能够描述“不同使用层次”的形容词。从四个选项中，我们需要找到一个与“不同”或“多样”意义相近的词。 A选项“various”意为“各种各样的”，符合上下文中描述英语使用层次多样的语境。 B选项“similar”意为“相似的”，与“不同”的意思相反，因此不符合语境。 C选项“familiar”意为“熟悉的”，虽然可能适用于描述人们对英语的使用，但并不能强调使用层次的多样性，因此不是最佳选择。 D选项“same”意为“相同的”，与“不同”的意思完全相反，显然不适合此处的语境。 因此，根据上下文语境和选项的意义，最合适的答案是A选项“various”，表示英语在使用层次上是多种多样的。